Mystery, Maybe Pooley?

Folks,
Hello, my name is John, I'm actually an acoustic phonograph collector. I have a couple of newer phono/radio combos I'll hopefull be asking you all about soon. But my reason for searching out and joining a radio forum right now is a odd home-built (I think) acoustic phono I recently bought. The seller believes it to be a Pooley cabinet, if it is I don't think it was meant for a phonograph. Before I start rebuilding this with a better motor and tone-arm I want to find out for sure what it was. The second photo is what I found underneath the motorboard. Does this look like an early radio? anyone ever seen something like this. Thank you.

Regards,
J.

[ekimetsok]

Hi John:

If it is indeed a Pooley manufactured cabinet, it would appear that someone went far out of their way to retro fit it into a phranken phono. What was originally the front is now a side, which would require fabricating a solid panel, replacing the speaker opening and shelf for the reciever. Additionally, I would question the integrity of the structure since one of the sides (now apparently the front) was eliminated to mount the horn.

Pooley Furniture Co. was out of Philadelphia and built cabinets for Victor, across the river in Camden. They also manufactured radio cabinets for Atwater Kent Radios, another Philly Company. AK radios (and some early Philcos as well) were also mounted in furniture built by Red Lion. Many of the Atwater Kent radios had tags on the back or inside indicating who manufactured the cabinet.

ekimetsok,
Thank you. I did find one Atwater-Kent advert with something vaguely similar, but nothing else on the web. The cabinet is very sturdy, better than both my Edison Phonographs! You don't think the horn is original? It is well made and matches the cabinet perfectly. It is free floating in the front and even though it is decorated I have found evidence of a cover on it at some point-four small holes in the corners. Would it have had a speaker and control panel on one of the long sides? The side opposite the crank has a hole, very well plugged, in the same position. It's tough to see in the photos, but two of the sides are different than the other two. One long and one short side have a lip or rim at the top, yet they all match up at the bottom. The top appears to have been hinged on the short side behind the tonearm at one point and it has a lip screwed on the underside holding the copper colored cloth-could there be a makers decal under there? When it was a radio did the top lift up?
I have got some grief about this machine on a phonograph board I belong to. I find this odd duck fascinating, someone put a lot of work into this cabinet and I think it deserves to be saved. They did a rotten job on the phonograph part, cheap motor, crappy tonearm and poor layout, but the cabinet and horn are to interesting too trash IMHO.
Thanks again for the info.

Regards,
J.

[ekimetsok]

Here's a mess of Atwater Kent photos from the Radio Attic Archives website:

http://radioatticarchives.com/archive_a6.htm

Back in the 1920's, everything radio-related was originally sold separately. You paid one price for the reciever and the speaker, tubes, batteries, and cabinets were additional. Atwater Kent started in the manufacture of automobile parts, and fabricated most of their sets out of steel. Recognizing the lady of the house wanted something to blend with her household furnishings, they contracted the wooden cabinets to other manufacturers. Therefore, it would not be unusual to see a model 55 or model 60 chassis in any number of different wooden enclosures. Besides Pooley and Red Lion, Kiel was yet another of those outside cabinet vendors. (The 60C resembling a table pictured above was one of their biggest sellers.)